Most dog owners, who love their dogs, try to extend as much TLC to them as they can. However, when they assume that what is good for them is also good for the dog, they make some terrible mistakes….

Dog do not have monkey stomachs!

Some anatomic facts to consider…

A dog stomach is elastic, like an accordion. When empty, it folds to what almost appears to be an intestine. When it is filled, it can contain as much as 7-8% of the dog's body weight! (For a human weighing 120 pounds, this would correspond to eating 10 pounds in one meal - but a human stomach is a bag with almost no elasticity - it simply cannot do more than about 10% of this…)

Further, the dog's stomach is full of small glands that produce digestive enzymes. Those glands start to work when they get in contact with food. This will happen for some of them immediately as the dog gets some food in the stomach, but, because of the folding nature of the stomach, most of those glands do not get to touch food, unless the stomach is filled so that all the folds are stretched out!

An amazing consequence of this is that the dog's digestion process is more efficient when it gets a large meal! While it still might digest a certain fraction of a small meal, that fraction will be much larger for a larger meal! Dogs that are being fed almost exclusively "full meals" (= meals that fill the stomach), generally need some 20-30% less food than dogs that are being fed many smaller meals. (This is exactly the opposite of what would be true for a human stomach...)

The ultimate carnivore experience

Dogs, like other carnivores, do not rely on having food available all the time. In fact, when they have a full stomach or recently had one, they don't even bother looking to the side of a possible prey. Instead, they feed very irregularly - when food is available, and they have hunting success. At such times, they gorge and fill themselves - and there is no discussion possible that they thoroughly enjoy doing that!

Many people also experience that, when they have difficulty getting the dog to eat something new, a simple way to get it to eat it is to first give it a little of what you know they like - then it will eat almost anything after that to fill the stomach! This illustrates that filling the stomach is more important to a dog than just "getting a little bite".

Yet, most domestic dogs never get to experience this…

Keeping the dog constantly starving...

Few dog owners want to starve their dog or to keep it constantly hungry. Nevertheless, this is what most people end up doing when they feed their dog multiple daily meals, assuming that this is just as good for a dog as it is for a human.

An adult dog needs an amount of food in average per day that is about 2-3% of its body weight. Considering that it takes 6-8% to fill the stomach, there is just no way the average dog will ever get to experience the satisfying fulfillment of having a full stomach... With 2-3 small meals per day, it will remain constantly hungry!

Changing the feeding pattern

Now, you cannot just start letting a dog fill its stomach, cold turkey, if it has never been used to this. It would be dangerous (risk of bloat because the muscle tissue is far too weak from never having been exercised). Doing it with kibble is, of course, completely out of the question too - it is far too concentrated.

Also, when you ultimately feed your dog as much as it wants in one meal, you cannot feed it more than 3-4 meals per week! However, when you do this, you will see the "food searching" behavior disappear, and you will see your dog gain weight if it is too skinny and lose weight if it is too fat.

You have an important hurdle to overcome before you can safely let you dog eat full meals 3-4 times a week - in addition to your own human-based emotions:

You must train the stomach muscles to handle the greater volume of a meal. It is like training a broken leg for skiing after getting the cast off... Do it gradually over a period of at least 3 months, preferably 6. (Please refer to my article on Conditioning if you need help with this.)

I know the concept of feeding only 3-4 times per week sounds brutal - but seriously: it isn't. My dogs have been fed this way for more than 30 years, and I tell you: they enjoy their meals!!! But they also enjoy the time between the meals. I have never had a problem with weight - it regulates itself on an individual basis. I have helped literally hundreds of my students to do the same, and they all report the same great results.... not a single exception!

Sincerely,

Mogens Eliasen

There is also an article embedded in this one that details conditioning your dog's stomach. Be sure to click that to get the full idea of what he is talking about here.

In theory I guess I could agree with the design of a dog's stomach but I can't even fathom just feeding my dogs 3-4 times per week (although I realize they don't have a monkey stomach)

Again, I think you need to go with what works for your dogs. His ending statement in the article was

I know the concept of feeding only 3-4 times per week sounds brutal - but seriously: it isn't. My dogs have been fed this way for more than 30 years, and I tell you: they enjoy their meals!!! But they also enjoy the time between the meals. I have never had a problem with weight - it regulates itself on an individual basis.

I can certainly attest that my dogs enjoy their meals, enjoy their time between meals and they are all fit (even with a monkey feeding program)

That article actually reminded me of Ori Hofmekler's theory around The Warrior Diet for humans. Basically eating very little to nothing throughout the entire day and then eating one giant meal at the end of the day (to simulate the old warrior's diet). Being the nut I am I tried to to see what it was like for a few weeks. Can't say that it worked for me (dizzy, headache, blurry vision and would crash right after dinner every night).

I didn't read the article as advocating feeding your dogs 3-4 times a week, that's just what he does. I thought he was suggesting feeding them this way with the end result being they eat 6 meals a week. I could have that wrong but it was just my interpretation.

maberi wrote:PS - It is possible i misread the artice too but it seemed as if he was suggested feeding 3-4 times a week (not every day) was the best way to go

No, he is suggesting that. It's called "gorge and fast" feeding, and I know ALOT of raw feeders do it. I couldn't feed like that on a regular basis.

I know some that do also, I touched on this in my post on the 'do you fast your dog thread'. Like I said, it is all personal preference, the dogs dont suffer for it. Feed your dog a very heavy meal & dont feed him the next day, or possibly the day after as well. The dogs get as much food weekly as if you did feed every day, just spaced out differently. They may miss a meal but they are not missing nutrition.

ALL raw feeder authors think they are the ONLY ones doing it right, IMO let your dog lead the way. If what you are doing works for you dog...then you are doing it right.

There's a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line.

It seems to kind of go along with the raw feeding theme that food is an "overall picture" type of game, rather than something that needs to be micromanaged. Like one of my dogs (Sirius) can go two or three days eating straight muscle meat with no bone before he starts to get diarrhea, so his bone percentage can be given on a weekly basis instead of a daily basis. And some raw feeders will feed a little bit of liver every day to meet their dog's requirement, where others will give a big hunk of liver once a week. Seems the gorge and fast feeders do the same thing, break up their weekly food poundage into three or four days instead of seven.

I guess I am just used to hearing so many off the beaten path nutrition theories for humans that I tend to be skeptical of people who don't have an educational background in this area

PS - It is possible i misread the artice too but it seemed as if he was suggested feeding 3-4 times a week (not every day) was the best way to go

I understand your concerns with his other credentials...however, the one I bolded...that's a Master's in Science in the field of Chemistry from an accredited university (for example, my Master's degree in psych is listed as Scientiae Magisterium - it's just Latin).... I do know Chemists who have made a specialty for themselves in human nutrition....

Like I said, I agree that the others are a bit suspicious....

cheekymunkee wrote:I know some that do also, I touched on this in my post on the 'do you fast your dog thread'. Like I said, it is all personal preference, the dogs dont suffer for it. Feed your dog a very heavy meal & dont feed him the next day, or possibly the day after as well. The dogs get as much food weekly as if you did feed every day, just spaced out differently. They may miss a meal but they are not missing nutrition.

ALL raw feeder authors think they are the ONLY ones doing it right, IMO let your dog lead the way. If what you are doing works for you dog...then you are doing it right.

I know the concept of feeding only 3-4 times per week sounds brutal - but seriously: it isn't. My dogs have been fed this way for more than 30 years, and I tell you: they enjoy their meals!!!

I would have to say of course they enjoy thier meals...they are bloody well starving by the time you get around to feeding them again..

and

But they also enjoy the time between the meals

OR are they simply bounding about and playing with you and being good as gold in the vain hope that you will hand out more food perhaps?

Ahhhhh

I have helped literally hundreds of my students to do the same, and they all report the same great results.... not a single exception!

Oh the blessed blind faith of the educated ones...you silly person! they "report" great results ...did you witness them? every single one did exactly as they were told and kept thier best friends Fido ad Fi-Fi on this diet regime for years did they even when poor Fido and Fi-Fi were whining with hunger and looking up at them with big,brown ,sad eyes?...

I know the concept of feeding only 3-4 times per week sounds brutal - but seriously: it isn't. My dogs have been fed this way for more than 30 years, and I tell you: they enjoy their meals!!!

I would have to say of course they enjoy thier meals...they are bloody well starving by the time you get around to feeding them again..

and

But they also enjoy the time between the meals

OR are they simply bounding about and playing with you and being good as gold in the vain hope that you will hand out more food perhaps?

Ahhhhh

I have helped literally hundreds of my students to do the same, and they all report the same great results.... not a single exception!

Oh the blessed blind faith of the educated ones...you silly person! they "report" great results ...did you witness them? every single one did exactly as they were told and kept thier best friends Fido ad Fi-Fi on this diet regime for years did they even when poor Fido and Fi-Fi were whining with hunger and looking up at them with big,brown ,sad eyes?...

I think it's important to remember (as already mentioned) different things work for different households. I don't think the over the top sarcasm is really called for. We aren't sure of this guy's credentials no, but what are YOUR canine nutrition credentials?

but I do know when I am reading a made up story...and that was one...whether it was to spark discussion or to have a laugh I dont know...but a dog is a dog is a dog...and they just dont work that way

I dont see my sarcasm as "way over the top" anyway...its obviously a joke and I was ridiculing it a little bit..

of course his dogs enjoy thier meals after two or three days with no food...its because thier bloody starving!...thats just plain old fashioned common sence

Why are you so keen to defend this paper?

If I had to say anything in my defense which I dont but what the heck lets blow my own trumpet a bit...I have several dogs....most NEVER go to the vet...they are all a healthy,height and weight ratio and many of them are living WELL past thier general expectancy...so I aint doing too bad at feeding my dogs...thanks

but a human stomach is a bag with almost no elasticity - it simply cannot do more than about 10% of this…)

I also have to ??? this..if this were true then how could obese people occur at all?...if this were true then how can previously overweight people go back to a "normal" weight...if this were true then why did a surgeon suggest to my friend Peggy that the way to deal with her obesity was to cut 40% of her stomach away and then proceed to warn her that if she continued to overeat in the same manner after the surgery that her stomach would enlarge again and that he would refuse to help her a second time...

Oh yea, I remember who you are now. Actually, your over the top-ness is perfectly fitting for you. I mean you are the same person who has a flippin' fit if anyone dares to talk about the current state of EB breed right? Anywho....

I'm not keen to defend the paper, I simply posted it for honest discussion. Not bullshyt sarcasm and non-discussion which is what you've contributed thus far. I think it's already been mentioned more than once that different things work for different households. I'm not sure why you are getting so defensive about your feeding techniques that you need to mention them? No one was questioning anyone's particular feeding routine.

still I looked further into this and have just skimmed one of his papers translated to Dutch so I could get the hang of it and I see that this regime he is mentioning here is apparently not for dogs fed on anything but raw food and thats literally taken as no yoghurts and veggies that I know some like to add in...the meaning of this is that you take the dog back to its "inner wolf" as he calls it and you literally dont feed for days...always odd numbers of days apparently and then you dump 4/5lbs of raw unprocessed meat on to the floor and let the dog alone with it...